. Here is my Austria entry. Austria was relaxing and tamed, but Ill try to spice up the entry a little.

We are going to Paris tomorrow morning so Ill put my Swityerland entry in from there.

Cheers!

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-- Austria, ahhh....

Arriving in Austria, on the early morning train from Budapest, we both exhaled a deep sigh of relief. Hungary was great but the heat, non-english speaking locals and slight frustration from some of the local hassles were getting to us. It was a big relief once we heard the sound of proper english coming from our train conductors mouth as we went from Vienna to Salzburg, our midway point from Budapest.

"Passport? Why the hell would you need a passport in the middle of Austria!" said the smiling austrian train conductor as I handed over all of my documents to her from our train cubicle

. After dealing with so many non english speaking folk, we had grown accustomed to simply handing over all of my documents and letting them pick from the assortment of wrinkled and now slightly torn papers which consisted of our Eurail passes, passports, some gum wrappers and some other, now non-identifiable, documents.

These were the nicest words we had heard in days...

-- Salzburg

Always taking word of mouth over guide books, we decided to head straight to Salzburg rather than Vienna as our friend had suggested. We hoped that Salzburg would have enough to make our 3 day stay enjoyable, luckly, it did.

One hill top castle... check,Enough Schitzel to make you go blind... check,Numerous music concerts... check,One bed and breakfast nestled in the Austrian hills... check!

More than enough... and to put the cherry on top, we arrived right in the middle of the Salzburg Music festival!

Saweeeet...

-- The Vienna Mission

With military precision, a well planned ( ok maybe not all that well planned..

. Mozarts Birth Place, the hill top castle, the rolling hills... Salzburg proved itself to be quite a nice little town and well worth the 3 day stop over. Although the weather wasnt that great, the pictures speak for themselves.

After an inspiring 8pm Organ recital in a big old baroque cathedral we caught a late night train to Switzerland and here we are... actually currently with one foot out the door on the way to Paris.